BudaPost signing off

Dear Readers,

It is with a mixture of gratitude and sadness that I announce the closure of BudaPost.

The foundation that funded our daily Hungarian press review in English and German for the past decade stopped supporting us in March last year and since then, my efforts to find a replacement have remained unsuccessful.

I am enormously grateful to my colleagues, Frank Fischer, Nick Thorpe, and Sebastian Garthoff who have continued producing BudaPost unpaid, daily, for 15 months.

I am also saddened to say goodbye to our tens of thousands of readers – both our English and German versions have consistently received between 11 thousand and 17 thousand hits daily this year.

Thank you very much for having been friends of BudaPost.

János Betlen

Hungary team causes disappointment at the European Football Championship

A desperate commentator suggests that after the dismal performance of the national team in their first two matches at the European Championship in Germany, winning the third one is a must to save their honour. READ MORE

Fidesz not to join Meloni’s ECR

A liberal columnist sees the governing party’s decision not to join the Conservatives and Reformers group in the European Parliament as sour grapes. READ MORE

PM Orbán supports Rutte’s bid for NATO Secretary General

A pro-government columnist pokes fun at the Dutch Prime Minister who simply withdrew his disparaging remarks about Hungary’s government to remove an obstacle to his candidacy for Secretary General of NATO. READ MORE

Opposing views on the Ukraine peace conference

A left-wing commentator cautiously welcomes the outcome of the summit held in Switzerland on the war in Ukraine, while a pro-government columnist believes that it did nothing to promote peace. READ MORE

Right-wing parties gain support in EU elections

A pro-government columnist pokes fun at the mainstream European press for ringing the alarm bell at the strengthening of hard-right parties in Europe. READ MORE

Weeklies on last week’s election for the European Parliament

Opposition-leaning commentators welcome the unexpectedly good performance of Peter Magyar’s recently founded TISZA party and interpret the result as a setback for Fidesz. Pro-government columnists expected better scores from Prime Minister Orbán’s party but see no imminent threat in the outcome of the election. READ MORE

EU court fines Hungary

In the latest of his highly opinionated columns, a pro-government pundit vituperates against the court ruling. READ MORE

Momentum voted out of the EP and the Budapest City Hall

A liberal analyst finds it paradoxical but also natural that the European elections are about domestic rather than continental issues. READ MORE

PM Orbán stands for a European sovereignist alliance

A conservative critic of the government believes that the two rival right-wing groups of the European Parliament will find it hard to merge. READ MORE